Daybreak: A Romance of an Old World | Page 3

with this conversation, let me tell you a little more about Margaret and
my relations to her.
There was good cause for her complaint. I was at that time a sort of animated icicle, as far
as my emotional nature was concerned. But although I could not express my feelings to
Margaret in set phrase, I do not mind saying to you that I loved her dearly, or thought I
did, which was the same thing for the time being. I loved her as well as I was capable of
loving anybody. What I lacked Margaret more than made up, for she was the
warmest-hearted creature in all the world. If I should begin to enumerate her perfections
of person and character I should never care to stop.
Her educational advantages had been far above the average, and she had improved them
in a manner to gratify her friends and create for herself abundant mental resources. She
had taken the full classical course at Harvard, carrying off several of the high prizes, had

then enjoyed two years of post-graduate work at Clark, and finally spent two more years
in foreign travel and study. As has been intimated, I had been over for her, and we were
now on our way home, expecting to land on the morrow or the day after.
If you imagine that Margaret had lost anything by her education or was less fitted to
make a good home, it is because you never knew her. Instead of being stunted in her
growth, broken in constitution, round-shouldered, pale-faced and weak-eyed, the
development of her body had kept pace with the expansion of her mind, and she was now
in the perfect flower of young womanhood, with body and soul both of generous mold.
Her marvelous beauty had been refined and heightened by her intellectual culture, and
even her manners, so charming before, were now more than ever the chaste and well-
ordered adornments of a noble character. She was as vivacious and sparkling as if she had
never known the restraints of school, but without extravagance of any kind to detract
from her self-poise. In short, she was a symphony, a grand and harmonious composition,
and still human enough to love a mortal like me. Such was the woman who was trying to
instill into my wooing a little of the warmth and sympathy of her delightful nature. As for
myself, it will be necessary to mention only a single characteristic. I had a remarkably
good ear, as we say. Not only was my sense of hearing unusually acute, but I had an
almost abnormal appreciation of musical sounds. Although without the ability to sing or
play and without the habit of application necessary to learn these accomplishments, I was,
from my earliest years, a great lover of music. People who are born without the power of
nicely discriminating between sounds often say they enjoy music, but these excellent
people do not begin to understand the intense pleasure with which one listens, whose
auricular nerves are more highly developed. But this rare and soul-stirring enjoyment is
many times accompanied, as in my case, with acute suffering whenever the tympanum is
made to resound with the slightest discord. The most painful moments of my life,
physically speaking, have been those in which I have been forced to listen to diabolical
noises. A harsh, rasping sound has often given me a pang more severe than neuralgia,
while even an uncultivated voice or an instrument out of tune has jarred on my sensitive
nerves for hours.
My musical friends all hated me in their hearts, for my peculiarity made me a merciless
critic; and the most serious youthful quarrel between Margaret and myself arose from the
same cause. Nature had given Margaret a voice of rare sweetness and a fine musical taste,
and her friends had encouraged her in singing from her youth. One day, before she had
received much instruction, she innocently asked me to listen to a song she was studying,
when I was cruel enough to laugh at her and ridicule the idea of her ever learning to sing
correctly. This rudeness made such an impression on her girlish mind that, although she
forgave the offense and continued to love the offender, she could never be induced again
to try her vocal powers before me. All through her school and college days she devoted
some attention to music, and while I heard from others much about her advancement and
the extraordinary quality of her voice, she always declared she would never sing for me
until she was sure she could put me to shame for my early indiscretion, so painfully
present in her memory. This became in time quite a feature of our long courtship, for I
was constantly